Restaurant Talk: Bolsa happy hour

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We gotta keep it real here. I’ve only ever eaten at Bolsa twice. The prices, for me, put Bolsa in the special-occasion bracket, but then it’s not where I want to eat on my birthday. So I rarely get the opportunity.

But, fellow renters and beatniks, there is hope for us: Bolsa happy hour.

From 3-5 p.m. Monday-Friday and all day on Tuesdays, every cocktail on the Bolsa menu is $5. This is an opportunity to sip fancy, labor-intensive cocktails at half the regular price and rub elbows at the bar with well-heeled Cliffites who will find you utterly Bohemian.

Bolsa is in a converted mechanic’s shop, the Settles Garage, at West Davis and Llewellyn. It boasts the loveliest dining patio in Oak Cliff, plus a friendly and professional staff.

We tried three cocktails. The Blackberry Crush contains muddled blackberries, orange-flavored vodka, orange liqueur and ginger beer. It was pretty and refreshing, but it tasted mostly of ginger beer. We moved on to the Mad Hatter. This is muddled raspberries and strawberries, vodka, citrus liqueur and champagne. I could drink them all day. We wondered how we might make a pitcher of them at home. Finally, we asked out the prettiest girl at the dance: Rita Rioja. This is tequila and citrus juices with a beet puree. “It’s basically a beet margarita,” our bartender told us. It is maybe the most unusual cocktail I’ve ever tasted and certainly among the most delightful.

It is sweet with a slight taste of beets, and it is the fairest cocktail of them all.

Earlier that day, my happy-hour pal had asked her manicurist for beet-colored polish. We think the manicurist was a shade off:

Bolsa also offers food at happy hour. Along with flat breads, which are about $14 each, there are several sandwiches for around $8 each. Not a bad deal at all.

1 Comment

“We gotta keep it real here. I’ve only ever eaten at Bolsa twice. The
prices, for me, put Bolsa in the special-occasion bracket, but then it’s
not where I want to eat on my birthday. So I rarely get the
opportunity.”